


Whole

by meils121



Category: Leverage
Genre: Light Angst, Multi, Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:13:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25871155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meils121/pseuds/meils121
Summary: Hardison is day.Eliot is night.Parker is twilight.  Parker is dawn.Together, they are whole.
Relationships: Alec Hardison/Parker/Eliot Spencer
Comments: 4
Kudos: 38
Collections: The Leverage Exchange Master Collection





	Whole

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elysiumwaits](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elysiumwaits/gifts).



Hardison is day.

He’s - and this sounds strange, to anyone who doesn’t understand the way they live - he’s the good one. He’s the one who offers a shoulder to cry on when a client gets overwhelmed by their circumstances. He’s the one to find a reason to smile even when it’s a bad day and a bad week and a bad everything. He’s encouraging and supportive and everything you’d want in a person. Sure, he can scheme like they all can. He’s still a criminal. But he’s a criminal with a heart. Not all of them can say that, at least not early on. 

Hardison is light and sun. He doesn’t hide like the rest of them. He has no reason to. He may be a criminal, but until he joined the crew, his experience with the dark - the truly evil - was non-existent. He understands, now, to an extent, but only in the way a good person can. True evil will corrupt you right down to your soul. Hardison’s soul still shines bright. There are days, though - of course there are days - when the world feels a little too bright even for him. Days when the brightness is blinding and he’s just one more person in a world too busy for anyone. Days when he wonders how he’s supposed to keep being lightness when the world seems to want him to be dark.

Eliot is night.

He’s spent years believing he was a monster. He still spends many nights tossing and turning and wondering if it’s possible to stop being a monster. He is dangerous and too-often angry and too quick to resort to violence. He says it’s all he’s ever known, even if he knew for close to two decades something very different. But night does not reveal its secrets the way day does. Night hides them away, tucks them into shadowy corners. 

Eliot is darkness. He knows it and the world knows it. Sometimes, the crew doesn’t act like they believe it. Eliot’s not always sure to do then, because darkness is safe. It hides him from the monsters that make even him shudder. It protects him, shields him in a way no weapon can. It scares him to think of what would happen if that darkness was stripped away, if a light was shined on every little scar and the world found out all his weaknesses. The light scares him sometimes worse than the dark does, and isn’t that just something? Eliot wonders just how twisted his mind has become and then tries not to think about the answer. It will hurt too much anyways. 

Night and day can coexist. But day does not immediately turn into night, nor does night into day. An in-between is needed to soften the otherwise jarring change. 

Parker is twilight. 

She exists in the shadows - not the looming shadows of nighttime nor the funny ones of daytime but the shapeshifting ones of early evening, when fading light plays tricks. Daytime can be too bright for Parker, too filled with people who don’t understand what it’s like to have anger and hurt weighing down your heart. Parker doesn’t quite get those people, normal people who have normal lives and do normal things and certainly don’t rappel down building for fun. 

So Parker waits for those people to return home, to continue carrying out their normal lives while she explores the emptiness they’ve left in their wake. She moves like a shadow, even, easily slipping into places she doesn’t belong and doesn’t want to understand. 

Hardison will never understand night, never understand true darkness. Parker’s there to guide him, softly, gently. She takes the burden of knowing what Eliot’s truly capable of - of knowing just how far a person can fall - and tucks it away where it can’t hurt Hardison, because she loves Hardison and doesn’t want him to hurt. 

Parker is dawn. 

She exists in that funny piece of time when it’s not light and not dark and the sky’s really just a dusty shade of greyish pink. Nighttime isn’t Parker’s favorite, not always, not when the darkness reminds her of the scary places in her third foster home. She doesn’t fit there, either, too naively knowledgeable and too innocently perceptive to feel comfortable in such a world. 

Eliot - Eliot yearns for light, for day. He doesn’t think he deserves it, doesn’t think Hardison should have to deal with Eliot. So Parker guides him out of the dark, holds his hand while he blinks in the bright lights. Helps him soften his edges and set aside the dark for at least a little while. 

Together, they are whole.


End file.
